Eater of Souls fight is too difficult.

[Egg Shennn.6240]

@rapthorne.7345 said:

I have killed him now on every new HoT elite spec in a minute or two.

Wait. what? You've gone through the story on all 9 classes in the first week of the game launch? And you ran around getting each specialization on all the classes?

Does someone really have that amount of time to play a video game?

[Walhalla.5473]

@Egg Shennn.6240 said:

@rapthorne.7345 said:

I have killed him now on every new HoT elite spec in a minute or two.

Wait. what? You've gone through the story on all 9 classes in the first week of the game launch? And you ran around getting each specialization on all the classes?

Does someone really have that amount of time to play a video game?

If you take a vacation at that time for the whole week then yeah. You'd have the time for this.

[Rauderi.8706]

Got the kill on my first run through the instance. . . after breaking away to reset the fight, because I couldn't kill it and it couldn't kill me.Quick trip to the forums for the vital advice of "move to range during life drain" and the fight was pretty cake after that.So, I should be more annoyed, because this is another fight that just gets so much easier for ranged characters, continuing ANet's tradition of melee hate.But it's done. Over, and no achievements associated with Eater of Souls (if I remember right).

So remember folks, wait for the jumping attack, then dodge/run away!I don't want the good advice to get lost in all the salt. :)

[BlaqueFyre.5678]

I don’t think it was too difficult I did it in one attempt with no issues, using Marauder gear, all of the Attacks from the boss have large tells allowing ample reaction time.

[Korval.3751]

@Avelione.6075 said:I HATE bosses that require very SPECIFIC approach : /that's very characteristic to Asian games. Blah. I want to fight, not solve a puzzle while my char. almost gets killed zillion times :/ And now, I have to do this nasty story part 3rd time! I wish I could just switch to the Soul Eater fight, not fight Balthazar and have all these idiotic conversations again. It made a great impression on me the 1st time, but it's just pissing me off now...I use my Guardian for the story, since I'm kinda the best with him, but kitten. Try not to use boons with a guardian.... I prepared for Balthazar for the 2nd approach and it went quick, but then there is no way to change my build for the soul eater! What kind of an idea is that?!?!?!

That's literally the point of the fight. It requires forethought ahead of the fight. Before you enter the story, you need to think ahead past the fight with Balt to the fight with the Eater. I changed my Guardian spec from Firebrand to Dragonhunter and changed my utilities and elites to speed and CC-related stuff. Then I just circled Joko's cage. The fight was much easier the second time around.

TL;DR this is NOT a melee fight. It's a ranged fight with a strong mix of speed and CC. All classes have these abilities. You will not be able to faceroll this boss, so don't try.

[Egg Shennn.6240]

@Korval.3751 said:

@Avelione.6075 said:I HATE bosses that require very SPECIFIC approach : /that's very characteristic to Asian games. Blah. I want to fight, not solve a puzzle while my char. almost gets killed zillion times :/ And now, I have to do this nasty story part 3rd time! I wish I could just switch to the Soul Eater fight, not fight Balthazar and have all these idiotic conversations again. It made a great impression on me the 1st time, but it's just pissing me off now...I use my Guardian for the story, since I'm kinda the best with him, but kitten. Try not to use boons with a guardian.... I prepared for Balthazar for the 2nd approach and it went quick, but then there is no way to change my build for the soul eater! What kind of an idea is that?!?!?!

That's literally the point of the fight. It requires forethought ahead of the fight. Before you enter the story, you need to think ahead past the fight with Balt to the fight with the Eater. I changed my Guardian spec from Firebrand to Dragonhunter and changed my utilities and elites to speed and CC-related stuff. Then I just circled Joko's cage. The fight was much easier the second time around.

TL;DR this is NOT a melee fight. It's a ranged fight with a strong mix of speed and CC. All classes have these abilities. You will not be able to faceroll this boss, so don't try.

How exactly are you supposed to "think ahead to the fight with the Eater" when you've never gotten there before? Psychic?Of course, once people have done it and posted how the fight is and what the best tactics are, you could prepare for it specifically, but if you're playing your story like a lot of people you have no idea what the fight will entail until you're there and see. Can't prepare for something when you don't know what is needed beforehand...

[MMAI.5892]

Also, for Guardians - Shield #5 works really well on his first defiance bar. It's pretty much instant and takes his defiance bar all the way down (or did for me).

Edit to add: It's Cooldown time will mean it's unavailable for the next string of heal attacks when he does them.

[fgr hyper.6219]

I have not found an acceptable weapon combo to defeat this guy with on an elementlaist . about to give up on POF as a result This is the most over powered boss fight I have ever encountered in a SINGLE MAN INSTANCE whoever thought of this idea should be fired.

[Manijin.3428]

I didn't even realize people were having a problem. Ran through the story on my Carrion Sw/F Fire-Earth-Weaver and didn't even realize he had a healing mechanic. Between invuln.'s, extra leaps, and just paying attention to AoEs and circles, I fought him like any other boss.

If you're struggling, consider changing your traits and skills around a bit. I can't imagine anyone having a hard time with this guy, and I've never done raids or high-end fractals.

[ShadowGryphon.6257]

Once you know what to look for, this is an easy fight.What to look for: when you see it about to jump and it creates the target circle it's going to jump to, interrupt it just before it jumps (sometimes this can be done just as it jumps as well).This stuns it and prevents it from sticking it's health sucking crazy straw in you, thereby allowing you free reign to unload some punishment.

[Korval.3751]

@Egg Shennn.6240 said:

@Korval.3751 said:

@Avelione.6075 said:I HATE bosses that require very SPECIFIC approach : /that's very characteristic to Asian games. Blah. I want to fight, not solve a puzzle while my char. almost gets killed zillion times :/ And now, I have to do this nasty story part 3rd time! I wish I could just switch to the Soul Eater fight, not fight Balthazar and have all these idiotic conversations again. It made a great impression on me the 1st time, but it's just pissing me off now...I use my Guardian for the story, since I'm kinda the best with him, but kitten. Try not to use boons with a guardian.... I prepared for Balthazar for the 2nd approach and it went quick, but then there is no way to change my build for the soul eater! What kind of an idea is that?!?!?!

That's literally the point of the fight. It requires forethought ahead of the fight. Before you enter the story, you need to think ahead past the fight with Balt to the fight with the Eater. I changed my Guardian spec from Firebrand to Dragonhunter and changed my utilities and elites to speed and CC-related stuff. Then I just circled Joko's cage. The fight was much easier the second time around.

TL;DR this is NOT a melee fight. It's a ranged fight with a strong mix of speed and CC. All classes have these abilities. You will not be able to faceroll this boss, so don't try.

How exactly are you supposed to "think ahead to the fight with the Eater" when you've never gotten there before? Psychic?Of course, once people have done it and posted how the fight is and what the best tactics are, you could prepare for it specifically, but if you're playing your story like a lot of people you have no idea what the fight will entail until you're there and see. Can't prepare for something when you don't know what is needed beforehand...

I'm speaking from experience. First time, I had no idea what this boss was about until it destroyed me. I tried a few more times to no success. I gave the fight thought and noted that it's a melee heavy fight, so I needed to go into the fight with ranged damage. Knowing that, forced me to change my spec. I went Dragonhunter. The fight with Balthazar wasn't any harder with the new spec (just more dodging), but it was significantly easier with the Eater. That's what "thinking ahead" means. The fact that a lot of people are discussing strategies, plus Dulfy has her guide, means most shouldn't be blind sided when the fight starts.

[Haishao.6851]

@fgr hyper.6219 said:I have not found an acceptable weapon combo to defeat this guy with on an elementlaist . about to give up on POF as a result This is the most over powered boss fight I have ever encountered in a SINGLE MAN INSTANCE whoever thought of this idea should be fired.

You don't need a weapon in particular. An ele would burn him down before he attempts a second drain. So just dodge or cancel the first and then kill him like it's anything else.

[Rhomulos.2089]

@Avelione.6075 said:I HATE bosses that require very SPECIFIC approach : /that's very characteristic to Asian games. Blah. I want to fight, not solve a puzzle while my char. almost gets killed zillion times :/ And now, I have to do this nasty story part 3rd time! I wish I could just switch to the Soul Eater fight, not fight Balthazar and have all these idiotic conversations again. It made a great impression on me the 1st time, but it's just pissing me off now...I use my Guardian for the story, since I'm kinda the best with him, but kitten. Try not to use boons with a guardian.... I prepared for Balthazar for the 2nd approach and it went quick, but then there is no way to change my build for the soul eater! What kind of an idea is that?!?!?!

You literally just do damage and dodge, break the obvious break bar if you put skills on for it.

[Orpheal.8263]

Seriously, everyone who has problems with this battle, absolutely doens't still have the slightest clues of this games combat system, and how especially HoT has changed it into an extreme CC fest with the pure intention to bring people to it to integrate skills /traits into their builds, with that they can CC foes, because then you will have it effectively much easier from that point on in the whole game, than as when you play a build with your character, which can't CC at all.

Thief = Play S/P and defeat this eneme in a few minutes, blindly and half asleep basically ... cause you have on demand CC with that you can always stun him whenever needed

Mesmer = Play Chronomancer and spam him with good time Wells full, use Shield Skills like Tides of Time with that you have even 2x the chance to stun it at the right time (pun indended), so you can still stun hi mat the perfect moment, even if you used the skill briefly too early when the effect returns

Warrior = Play a Hammer or Mace Berserker Build, lots of CC from the Hammer with Skill 4 and 5, plus Adrenalien Skill CC, same with Mace, so 6 skills you can use quickly to find a skil lcycle to ensure, that you stun him at the right moment, if one of them eventualyl got used too early, uve still enogh skilsl left that the ones you used too early will have recharged, before you run out of stun skills

Guardian = Play Hammer Dragonhunter with traps, skilsl 3 and 4 together with your traps will give you enough CC, aside of this is also as secodn set Scepter/Shield for Immobilize and another launch/push that wil lbreak the bar also under the effetc of immobilize

Ranger = Play Druid with LB & Staff/Glyphs, lots of daze ,pulls, pushes, immobilize ect. to ensure you cc him when needed and a pet, which can face tank for you and help also with CC/Chill, lots of helpful conditioon skilsl also likemuddy terrain, frost trap, spike trap, Entangle and your pets can provide also more cc to help you and momement impairing conditions

Engineer = play scrapper, use Battering ram to have an easy accessible quick reloadign cc skill you can use two tiems quickly after anoht,er for the case you used it too early the first moment, Net Turret helps alot , so does Thumper Turret as well and supply crate as elite is the natural CC bombardment par exellence here with that you boost also your dps

Necromancer = play Reaper, this class is made for melee combat and has the CC skills to kill the boss same as easily as thief, seriously, even with the tons of chil you put out that in this case also damages the foe over time,. Infusing Armor/Terrify, Executioner's Scythe, Chillign Scythe on the AA to keep up permanently Chill, , gravedigger, that becomes permanently more powerful so more damage you deal to the foe... death spiral for easy vulnerability access, nightfall form ore helpful conditions, , grasping darkness for the bar break, use golem, staff weapon as condi spam for more chill, fear, summon blood fiend for more dps/survival, spectral wall is helpful with its fear on touch, well of darkness as like suffering helps

Elementalist = play warhorn Tempest using skilsl like tidal surge, cyclone and wildfire, use in main hand Dagger for vulnerability, stuns, chill, launches ect as you cycle through the elements, frostbow helps you with dps, chill and deep freeze, lightning hammer helps you alot with launch, stun, n dps, use lesser elemental for dps/chill help..Tornado.. your launch elite par exellence, or elementals as elite for more cc help n dps help or fiery greatsword, if yo ujust want to try dps it as fast as possible down after the first successful cc to burn it down quickly to basicall give it as less chance to recover its break bar, as possible, before its already dead

Revenant = Hammer/Staff Revenant does the job here, Shiro is helpful for dps, on demand stun with jade winds, Mallyx helps with chill, torment and confusion as he moves quicly and alot following you around and attacks quickly, so if your a strogn condi rev, he basically kills itself, while you kite it around

[HawaiiMike.7260]

This fight is horrible...I'm ready to quit the damn game over this quest. The so called "breakbar" shows up for a fraction of a second. I haven't managed to break the blue bar except once with elementalist. It's nothing but die...die...die...die. I would be okay with the mechanics if that blue breakbar would stay for more that a fraction of a second. As it is any class without cast time CC is doomed. And you can't switch weapons once you've started the event.

The other thing that is horrible design is that if you get frustrated (I was the first time after an hour of death over and over again) You have to start the entire freaking quest over again with that horrible Balthazar event (which takes about 15 to 20 minutes just to get past that horrible experience). Other quest let you at least save progress if you quit of DC'd.

I can't believe that the event designers just wanted to punish the user base with this quest. At least let us save checkpoints on this thing! Getting ready to quit after my second try and I don't know if I can stand to do a third.

I would recommend at couple of things to make this quest bearable:

1. Reduce life force for Balthazar. Chipping away at his health bar for 15 minutes is no fun at all.

2. Allow checkpoint saves (i've seen this on other quest). Spending an hour to get back back to the frustration of "Eater of Souls" is disheartening.

3. Increase that breakbar period for Eater of Souls.

4. Alow the player to switch weapons and gear if needed after dieing.

[Korval.3751]

@HawaiiMike.7260 said:I would recommend at couple of things to make this quest bearable:

1. Reduce life force for Balthazar. Chipping away at his health bar for 15 minutes is no fun at all.
2. Allow checkpoint saves (i've seen this on other quest). Spending an hour to get back back to the frustration of "Eater of Souls" is disheartening.
3. Increase that breakbar period for Eater of Souls.
4. Alow the player to switch weapons and gear if needed after dieing.

This is where L2P has meaning. You're not thinking about the fight with both bosses. Facerolling isn't a strategy. There are plenty of comments in this thread from players offering a wide variety of strategies for different classes. Find the strat for your class and give it a try.

[Seera.5916]

@fgr hyper.6219 said:I have not found an acceptable weapon combo to defeat this guy with on an elementlaist . about to give up on POF as a result This is the most over powered boss fight I have ever encountered in a SINGLE MAN INSTANCE whoever thought of this idea should be fired.

Try this - go for the slower, secondary tactic:

1. Don't try to break his bar, just focus on taking his health down in between his health steal attacks
2. Kite the boss in melee or range distances. I ranged in melee because I can't kite at range worth anything with this guy.
3. Whatever you do, do not dodge. He won't hit you with anything worth dodging except for the life steal.
4. When you see the circle pop up, dodge TWICE away from the boss. This will get you out of the range of his life steal. Stay in max range until he does another jump.
5. Repeat steps 1-4 until he's dead

You may even shock yourself and break his bar a couple of times by accident.

[Deihnyx.6318]

These A> @Egg Shennn.6240 said:

@Korval.3751 said:

@Avelione.6075 said:I HATE bosses that require very SPECIFIC approach : /that's very characteristic to Asian games. Blah. I want to fight, not solve a puzzle while my char. almost gets killed zillion times :/ And now, I have to do this nasty story part 3rd time! I wish I could just switch to the Soul Eater fight, not fight Balthazar and have all these idiotic conversations again. It made a great impression on me the 1st time, but it's just pissing me off now...I use my Guardian for the story, since I'm kinda the best with him, but kitten. Try not to use boons with a guardian.... I prepared for Balthazar for the 2nd approach and it went quick, but then there is no way to change my build for the soul eater! What kind of an idea is that?!?!?!

That's literally the point of the fight. It requires forethought ahead of the fight. Before you enter the story, you need to think ahead past the fight with Balt to the fight with the Eater. I changed my Guardian spec from Firebrand to Dragonhunter and changed my utilities and elites to speed and CC-related stuff. Then I just circled Joko's cage. The fight was much easier the second time around.

TL;DR this is NOT a melee fight. It's a ranged fight with a strong mix of speed and CC. All classes have these abilities. You will not be able to faceroll this boss, so don't try.

How exactly are you supposed to "think ahead to the fight with the Eater" when you've never gotten there before? Psychic?Of course, once people have done it and posted how the fight is and what the best tactics are, you could prepare for it specifically, but if you're playing your story like a lot of people you have no idea what the fight will entail until you're there and see. Can't prepare for something when you don't know what is needed beforehand...

You are NOT supposed to defeat a boss first try!It's a boss, it requires some L2P, there's nothing wrong with thinking of a strategy, failing, and redoing it better.

I can't believe most people here never played a old school RPG, or any game with decent challenge for that matter....

[keyokku.5412]

I do agree with having a checkpoint/continue point but in terms of story it doesn't make sense if you can walk around open world alive after Balthazar s killing blow and cutscene... Unless as soon as you login if DC you are automatically in the dead instance

[Egg Shennn.6240]

@Deihnyx.6318 said:These A> @Egg Shennn.6240 said:

@Korval.3751 said:

@Avelione.6075 said:I HATE bosses that require very SPECIFIC approach : /that's very characteristic to Asian games. Blah. I want to fight, not solve a puzzle while my char. almost gets killed zillion times :/ And now, I have to do this nasty story part 3rd time! I wish I could just switch to the Soul Eater fight, not fight Balthazar and have all these idiotic conversations again. It made a great impression on me the 1st time, but it's just pissing me off now...I use my Guardian for the story, since I'm kinda the best with him, but kitten. Try not to use boons with a guardian.... I prepared for Balthazar for the 2nd approach and it went quick, but then there is no way to change my build for the soul eater! What kind of an idea is that?!?!?!

That's literally the point of the fight. It requires forethought ahead of the fight. Before you enter the story, you need to think ahead past the fight with Balt to the fight with the Eater. I changed my Guardian spec from Firebrand to Dragonhunter and changed my utilities and elites to speed and CC-related stuff. Then I just circled Joko's cage. The fight was much easier the second time around.

TL;DR this is NOT a melee fight. It's a ranged fight with a strong mix of speed and CC. All classes have these abilities. You will not be able to faceroll this boss, so don't try.

How exactly are you supposed to "think ahead to the fight with the Eater" when you've never gotten there before? Psychic?Of course, once people have done it and posted how the fight is and what the best tactics are, you could prepare for it specifically, but if you're playing your story like a lot of people you have no idea what the fight will entail until you're there and see. Can't prepare for something when you don't know what is needed beforehand...

You are NOT supposed to defeat a boss first try!It's a boss, it requires some L2P, there's nothing wrong with thinking of a strategy, failing, and redoing it better.

I can't believe most people here never played a old school RPG, or any game with decent challenge for that matter....

Don't quote me in your jabbering. I replied to the person saying to think ahead. You can't "think ahead" before you've encountered the bloody foe and have no idea what his mechanics are. Think ahead and bring these specific skills and do this specific strategy without knowing what's needed?

The point is, it's a drawn out process to get to the Eater, so I'm sure it was a major pain for people that failed and had to go back through all the blah blah blah. I killed him the first time, but the build I had wouldn't do it well, and as I said, ended up catching him and let minions slowly kill him, which wasn't much fun, but more fun than dying and redoing all the crap before just to get back to him.

[Seera.5916]

@Deihnyx.6318 said:These A> @Egg Shennn.6240 said:

@Korval.3751 said:

@Avelione.6075 said:I HATE bosses that require very SPECIFIC approach : /that's very characteristic to Asian games. Blah. I want to fight, not solve a puzzle while my char. almost gets killed zillion times :/ And now, I have to do this nasty story part 3rd time! I wish I could just switch to the Soul Eater fight, not fight Balthazar and have all these idiotic conversations again. It made a great impression on me the 1st time, but it's just pissing me off now...I use my Guardian for the story, since I'm kinda the best with him, but kitten. Try not to use boons with a guardian.... I prepared for Balthazar for the 2nd approach and it went quick, but then there is no way to change my build for the soul eater! What kind of an idea is that?!?!?!

That's literally the point of the fight. It requires forethought ahead of the fight. Before you enter the story, you need to think ahead past the fight with Balt to the fight with the Eater. I changed my Guardian spec from Firebrand to Dragonhunter and changed my utilities and elites to speed and CC-related stuff. Then I just circled Joko's cage. The fight was much easier the second time around.

TL;DR this is NOT a melee fight. It's a ranged fight with a strong mix of speed and CC. All classes have these abilities. You will not be able to faceroll this boss, so don't try.

How exactly are you supposed to "think ahead to the fight with the Eater" when you've never gotten there before? Psychic?Of course, once people have done it and posted how the fight is and what the best tactics are, you could prepare for it specifically, but if you're playing your story like a lot of people you have no idea what the fight will entail until you're there and see. Can't prepare for something when you don't know what is needed beforehand...

You are NOT supposed to defeat a boss first try!It's a boss, it requires some L2P, there's nothing wrong with thinking of a strategy, failing, and redoing it better.

I can't believe most people here never played a old school RPG, or any game with decent challenge for that matter....

Correct me if I'm wrong:

1. It's the first instance where we are locked out of our own inventory. Which means we can't access our bank. We can't reapply boosters. We can't use our repair canisters. We can't buy a more defensive set of gear if we've been zerker so long we've gotten rid of the non-zerker gear in our inventory. The only players that were able to change gear/weapons alongside traits and skills were those who happened to carry different stated sets in their inventory since we weren't locked out of the Equipment tab in the Hero panel. We had only 7 tries to kill the boss before the lack of repair canisters would start punishing us. Especially if we didn't have a spare set of gear in our inventory. There's no warning on this or anything.
2. It's already after a long fight with Balthazar for those of us who aren't the best at the game. This makes quitting and coming back a harder pill to swallow than if there was a check point where players could leave and come back to the story at a later time. I likely would have quit and come back after the second failure on Eater of Souls due to a lack of time issue if it had not been that I had already invested at least 1.25 hours into the mission.
3. It's the first fight where those besides the instance starter can't really help. So players who have an L2P issue who would normally group up, find that that isn't as helpful here.
4. I don't recall many bosses who do their big attacks back to back in the same order every time. If any. Recognizing that this boss does that may not be obvious for everyone. Especially for those who just use numbers to get past mechanics. This gets even less likely of an instance players would find if they don't do Dungeons, Fractals, or Raids on a regular basis.

I think there wouldn't be as much of a backlash if there had been a check point between the Balthazar fight and the Realm of the Dead portion. Where players could leave and come back after reformulating a strategy or just cooling off.

[castlemanic.3198]

The eater of souls needs to be reworked, I got super lucky that I managed to beat him on the first try because my build had plenty of cc and I accidentally broke is defiance bar before he jumps (btw, breaking his breakbar right before/as he jumps prevents his health recovery entirely, he will not go into that suck everything in phase right after).

Like seriously, how is anyone supposed to figure it out on their own? That defiance bar barely registers on the UI.

[ancientoak.4258]

Good use of cc and walking away from him when he tries to pul you in, prevents him to steal your life energy. After that full attack, and repeat. He keeps repeating the same thing al through the fight, so you can predict his attack when observing. I did it on a standard (boosted) revenant on a new account with worthless standard stats, without elite spec.

[Kuulpb.5412]

As far as I could tell, ANY stun breaks the bar, I was a d/d spellbreaker and I succeeded in breaking the bar multiple times. and my only proper cc was, as far as I recall, dagger 3.

[Kuulpb.5412]

@castlemanic.3198 said:The eater of souls needs to be reworked, I got super lucky that I managed to beat him on the first try because my build had plenty of cc and I accidentally broke is defiance bar before he jumps (btw, breaking his breakbar right before/as he jumps prevents his health recovery entirely, he will not go into that suck everything in phase right after).

Like seriously, how is anyone supposed to figure it out on their own? That defiance bar barely registers on the UI.

maybe it's just me, but I saw the defiance bar easily, and when I noticed it I focused on it.